ock to him to be asked for it
spontaneously.

"Bring it out, laddie!" he replied cordially. "I'm with you. Here, come
along into the garden, and state your case."

This suited me. It is always easier to talk intimately in the dark, and
I did not wish to be interrupted by the sudden entrance of the Hired
Man or Mrs. Beale, of which there was always a danger indoors. We
walked down to the paddock. Ukridge lit a cigar.

"Ukridge," I said, "I'm engaged!"

"What!" A huge hand whistled through the darkness and smote me heavily
between the shoulder-blades. "By Jove, old boy, I wish you luck. 'Pon
my Sam I do! Best thing in the world for you. Bachelors are mere
excrescences. Never knew what happiness was till I married. When's the
wedding to be?"

"That's where I want your advice. What you might call a difficulty has
arisen about the wedding. It's like this. I'm engaged to Phyllis
Derrick."

"Derrick? Derrick?"

"You can't have forgotten her! Good Lord, what eyes some men have! Why,
if I'd only seen her once, I should have remembered her all my life."

"I know, now. Rather a pretty girl, with blue eyes."

I stared at him blankly. It was not much good, as he could not see my
face, but it relieved me. "Rather a pretty girl!" What a description!

"Of course, yes," continued Ukridge. "She came to dinner here one night
with her father, that fat little buffer."

"As you were careful to call him to his face at the time, confound you!
It was that that started all the trouble."

"Trouble? What trouble?"

"Why, her father...."

"By Jove, I remember now! So worried lately, old boy, that my memory's
gone groggy. Of course! Her father fell into the sea, and you fished
him out. Why, damme, it's like the stories you read."

"It's also very like the stories I used to write. But they had one
point about them which this story hasn't. They invariably ended
happily, with the father joining the hero's and heroine's hands and
giving his blessing. Unfortunately, in the present case, that doesn't
seem likely to happen."

"The old man won't give his consent?"

"I'm afraid not. I haven't asked him yet, but the chances are against
it."

"But why? What's the matter with you? You're an excellent chap, sound
in wind and limb, and didn't you once tell me that, if you married, you
came into a pretty sizeable bit of money?"

"Yes, I do. That part of it is all right."

Ukridge's voice betrayed perplexity.

"I don't understand this t